Colonial Settlement

Is this a recyclable idea or another form of a hidden and silent tax increase for Pawtucket residents?

Spent some time in Pa and a few communities have tried and disappointing results and expensive ones for city residents.

Pay-as-you-throw trash program proposed

PAWTUCKET - A city currently ranked third from the bottom in the state for recycling could soon add a whole new level of incentive for dramatically reducing the city's sky-high level of waste.

Just two years away from higher required trash disposal fees that could cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars more in added trash disposal fees from the state, leaders are considering a plan to require residents to buy and use only city-authorized trash bags through a program that would be administered by South Carolina-based Waste Zero.

It's a plan aimed directly at changing wasteful behavior, saving both valuable dollars and the environment, say its proponents.

Pawtucket residents and business owners are currently achieving just a 15.9 percent recycling rate, below neighboring Central Falls, said representatives for a company seeking to make the city only the second Rhode Island municipality to implement its program. Waste Zero guarantees a 43 percent year-to-year waste reduction, one that, if achieved, could save taxpayers millions of dollars in trash disposal fees paid each year to the Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation.

The only other Rhode Island municipality currently utilizing the system from Waste Zero, which would negotiate a certain percentage of revenue created as an asking price for running the program, is Middletown, which has the highest recycling rate in the state at 43 percent, according to Waste Zero officials.

"We have to make some changes," said Pawtucket Public Works Director John "Jack" Carney, at an informational session between city leaders and representatives from Waste Zero, a national company dealing in waste reduction strategies.

Click here to view Waste Zero's initial Power Point proposal:

www.valleybreeze.com/www/Trash_presentation.pdf

The 2012 year "may not seem like it's very close, but to me it's very close," said Carney. "It's coming fast."

Pawtucket is currently responsible for a whopping 130 tons of trash thrown out per day, according to Carney. If residents don't exceed 35 percent recycling by 2012, he said, trash fees for the 33,800 tons of trash thrown out annually would approach $2 million. At the $32 rate, that same number of tons thrown out costs just over $1 million each year. Factor in a guaranteed 43 percent reduction in waste collected and disposed, and residents would be throwing out at least 14,534 fewer tons each year.

City Finance Director Ron Wunschel confirmed that the city is currently paying out just over $1 million in tipping fees associated with trash disposal, but that number would approach $2 million a year if residents don't achieve a 35 percent recycling rate or greater by 2012, assuming current trash disposal rates, according to Wunschel, not to mention the reduction in trash thrown away. Carney said that if and when the Central Landfill in Johnston shuts down, he said, per-ton fees could approach $90 and higher for out-of-state disposal costs.

Some members of the City Council, led by Councilor Jean Philippe Barros, expressed reluctance during an informational workshop last week to establish a "pay-as-you-throw" system, saying it might appear to many in Pawtucket as a "back-door tax" just a few months after residents and business owners saw their taxes balloon.

"To me, it's way too early to be talking about this," said Barros, later saying that "the only issue I have is the timing of all this."

City Council President Henry Kinch said that while he'll give representatives from Waste Zero a chance to fully demonstrate their plan, he has questions over whether it would succeed in an urban municipality like Pawtucket.

The pay-as-you-throw strategy, one that was briefly considered as a money-saving measure - hotly contested by taxpayers during budget deliberations earlier this year - would likely require residents to buy city-labeled trash bags for either $1 for the smaller bags, or $2 for larger bags of an undetermined size.

Those in city government who favor a pay-as-you-throw system say it would be better to start paying a little extra now than to wait and charge the taxpayers inevitably higher disposal fees if the city's moribund recycling rate does not improve drastically by 2012.

The pay-as-you-throw proposal has returned in an improved form, say officials from Waste Zero. Councilors questioned what would be offered this time around that differs from the company's spring presentation, to which Waste Zero officials responded that they have added an educational component to the program. Accompanied by city officials, they said, they will hold multiple meetings in each council district to answer any and all questions free of charge.

If the vast majority of residents oppose such a plan after the sessions, said officials from Waste Zero, leaders would have the option of rejecting it. It is not yet known when public informational sessions might begin.

Establishing a pay-as-you-throw program was expected to reduce the city's tax rate per $1,000 of assessed value by about 65 cents when it was proposed in the spring. Leaders said they don't expect to implement such a system until at least next spring, admitting even that timetable might be ambitious. Council members want to get the community's input before kicking off anything as revolutionary as a fee-based collection system.

"The refined version of this is going to come from the people in the neighborhoods," said Councilor Thomas Hodge.

The Waste Zero system, implemented with success in municipalities across the country, has been hailed as "the best waste reduction system in the world," according to the Environmental Protection Agency and "the single best way" to reduce waste, according to the Rhode Island Resource Recovery Agency.

Carney told council members that he has considered other incentives in trying to boost Pawtucket's recycling numbers, like a program that would require recycling bins on the sidewalk to have trash collected, but none have nearly the kind of improvement numbers that the city currently needs.

Though some council members expressed a wariness about approving a system that charges residents more for municipal services, representatives for Waste Zero emphasize that, unlike other fees levied, residents would not be rendered powerless to do anything about a bag fee. Indeed, said Waste Zero President Mark Dancy, a pay-as-you-throw program would create a new level of fairness for those who are currently doing well with recycling while providing all residents with a program they can control themselves through added recycling.

"Not one customer that we've started with has ever gotten out of it," Dancy told council members. The average number of bags thrown out per family in Waste Zero municipalities is just under two, said Dancy.

The choice is pay for the bags or pay higher property tax. I'd opt for the latter, since I fear "pay as you throw" would just lead to illegal dumping.

I think you are right. Maybe more trash fees from non resdent landlords and why not do as some do of no trash picked up unless recycling bins out also...It has worked and price is right.